A dark tale
by titianna
Summary: A gang of slavetraders is abducting children. Xena comes to the rescue - but will she be able to safe them. And how is this going to affect her relationship to Gabrielle?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: The characters of Xena and Gabrielle belong to Renaissance Pictures. No copyright infringements intended.

Disclaimer: Some subtext, some drastic violence.

I am asking for reviews - good, bad, however - this is a multichapter piece and I am still not able to see where this is leading me to.

Well, looks like I have not been able to wrap this up in two chapters - as originally planned. The villain has become more dark with the way this piece was going - some people appeared and disappeared - I have'nt even thought of while writing the first chapter.

I hope you stay with me through this - Enjoy.

**The First Time - a**** dark tale**

**Chapter 1**

Xena pulled the heavy saddle bag off Argos back and dropped it to the ground. With a quick flick of her hand she untied the beautiful mare and let her run free.

The spot was perfect for a campsite. They had just emerged from the shadows of a densely foliaged forest and before them – down a gentle slope – stretched grassland as far as Xena could see. Far off her sharp eyes descried the outlines of a village. A few mud brown houses ducked beneath thatched roofs and an array of colourful fields – straight and tiny, like towels. The evening sun painted bold orange strokes onto the clear blue sky that mirrored in the gurgling stream nearby.

But the day that lay behind the two travellers had been anything but perfect. Even the beauty of the peaceful Greek landscape failed to soothe Xena's pain. She had been clumsy, weak and slow and people had been hurt. Silently swearing she cleared a patch on the ground hacking away at the fresh green grass, while Gabrielle picked up some dry wood from the forest. They prepared a fire and their supper together, but each of them was absorbed in her own fury and grief – neither of them able or willing to share her emotions. The catastrophe had been building a long time, but they had hoped against better judgement that it would all work out fine.

Almost two weeks ago, they had come to a little village where there had been a horrible crime. Two children had been abducted while herding the goats over the quiet hours of mid day. Xena remembered Gabrielle's shocked face, as they talked to the traumatized parents who mourned the loss of a ten year old girl and her four year old baby brother. The warrior princess did not need to listen to the pleading voices of the parents as she rushed right behind the kidnappers, an angry crowd of villagers in her wake.

But very soon it became apparent that tracking down those guys was difficult even for an experienced warrior like Xena. The slavetraders were not only ruthless but also very clever and fast. Wherever Xena and her followers came in the next days the villains had been there before and people were besides themselves with worry and rage. And virtually nobody had actually seen those guys or discovered any traces of their whereabouts.

"We need to be faster," Xena stated the obvious one night when they had finally settled around a campfire, a little away from the crowd that was now following them in the waning hope to retrieve their children safe and sound.

"We don't even know where they are headed." Gabrielle replied. She looked exhausted, but she knew they could not give up yet.

"We have to split from the villagers," Xena stood up and pacing around the fire, went on: "They are slowing us down. Our advance can be spotted from leagues away. I bet they are just yet lying in the bushes and snickering over our headless actions."

Gabrielle watched the silhouette of her dark friend. Xena's anger and frustration was almost palpable. It was what the blond woman needed to calm down herself and finally come up with a suggestion, she had been mulling over the whole day: "We could split in more than two groups, each group moving in a different direction…"

"…than we could at least close in on them and get an idea about where to move," Xena easily picked up on Gabrielle's plan, shooting a small grin towards her friend "with messengers travelling from group to group we should be upon them in a matter of days. But…" she hesitated, "if they find out that someone is behind them, what if they just kill the children?"

The prospect sent an icy shiver down Gabrielle's spine. She considered this for a while, holding her hands closer to the fire. "In the worst case, Xena, they will kill the children anyway," she said finally.

Xena watched the villagers, who – not used to the strenuous travelling and paralyzed by fear and hope at the same time – huddled around some small campfires and tried to get some rest. Xena had fought many a battle but she found nothing that could prepare her now. She was afraid, that Gabrielle had it all right. She was aware that her fear was having an effect on her actions. And while Gabrielle finally succumbed to the needs of her body Xena was not able to find sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The next day they moved according to their feeble plan and in the evening they had a pretty good notion about where the slave traders were headed with their prey. Xena called in Gabrielle and the messengers that were to go between the groups to communicate their joint actions.

"Whatever happens," she explained, "we must not loose them. We will pull our groups on both sides around the kidnappers, forming a tight ring around them. Now, listen carefully!" Xena continued, looking into the eyes of every single man on this command, "You must under all circumstances avoid to be seen by the slave traders." She paused, driving the point home. "Keep them within the circle, but hide away. Let them move, which ever way they are moving." She waited until the men nodded their consent. Xena looked around and finally pointed to a boy of about 15 years, who was paying close attention to Xena's every word.

"What is your name, boy?" she asked.

"I am Kimos!" the boy answered proudly.

"Why are you here, Kimos?"

Xena looked the slim figure up and down, measuring the boy. But he did not budge, which gave him a lot of credit in Gabrielle's eye.

"I am here to rescue my brother, Taros. He is only 5 years old." Kimos voice became unsteady, but he quickly regained his composure: "My mother wants him back."

"Kimos," Xena continued, "when the circle is closed you will come to me and then, but not earlier we will think of some plan to safe your brother and the other children." With a curt nod she dismissed the men, who were eager to spread her word as soon as possible.

Only Gabrielle noticed the subtle change in her friend. Her usually relaxed back was rigid and the beautiful face looked utterly concerned. "Do not be worried, warrior princess," she said, putting her hands on Xena's shoulders, trying to sound confident herself, "if there is anybody who could help these people it is you."

"These are peaceful people, Gabrielle, village folk, not cold blooded warriors; they will rush in, taking foolish chances if it concerns their own kin. They might be determined, even desperate, not taking into consent the danger they are putting themselves in, but their greatest strength is also their greatest weakness." Xena explained. With a heavy sigh she relaxed against Gabrielle, who drew her into a tender careful embrace.

That was two days ago. Xena remembered the scene very vividly. If she had only concocted a better plan, had better men or more time…Motionless she stood on the edge of the forest looking into the advancing darkness. It was her fault, entirely her fault. She turned around seeing Gabrielle by the fire, scribbling something onto a roll of parchment. The anger that had been brewing in her all day suddenly seared up. With a few paces she advanced on her best friend. "What are you writing, Gabrielle?" she snarled, "There is nothing to write about the disaster we just caused!" Gabrielle scribbled on. She too was not in the mood of a quiet conversation – but she handled her anger in different ways. She sought solace in writing – and she knew that there was nothing wrong in that.

"Look at me," Xena yelled suddenly and pulled the silky blond hair away from her friends face. She heard Gabrielle's sharp intake of breath, but she could not contain her fury, "was that really the best I could do?"

Gabrielle did not answer, but Xena could see something unexpected in the bard's eyes. It was fear lurking in these green irises and rising slowly until it stared right into Xena's face. It drove her mad. How could Gabrielle dare be afraid of her, after all, what they had been through together? Xena lowered her head until she saw nothing but the emerald green eyes and this feeling. "Don't you know me?" she asked her voice raw from emotion and brushed her lips over Gabrielle's forehead, none to gently.

"Let go!" Gabrielle gasped and a single tear rolled down her cheek. Only now Xena realized that she still held her companions long hair and how tight it was wound around her hand. Gabrielle's scroll had fallen to the ground and Xena all but stood on it nearly ripping the valuable material. She released her friend and Gabrielle stood up. There was no fear in her eyes now.

"I don't know if I ever want to know you!" Gabrielle looked like she was going to beat the mighty warrior princess but then she stormed away leaving a perplexed Xena behind.

Gabrielle never believed that physical action could subdue emotional turmoil, but this time she ran until she collapsed on the narrow bank of the stream. Her breath came in rugged gasps and she was even to exhausted to cry. She lay flat on the ground looking back, to where she had come from. She felt better now, and wondered how this was possible.

Far away in the darkness she could make out the edge of the forest and she imagined her friend standing there, hating herself desperately. Well, should she – if Xena wanted to feel this way, Gabrielle could do nothing about it: She had tried so many times and had not succeeded. Xena had to wade through this, but it was better not be around the warrior right now.

The sheet of perspiration on Gabrielle's skin had cooled down in the crisp night air and Gabrielle shivered. She longed for the warmth of the fire, but there was no way of returning to it now. Testing the water with her bare foot she decided to take a dip to wash off. The water was cool and soft, relaxing Gabrielle's tight muscles.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The next morning had come with a beautiful sunrise and an uneasy feeling in Gabrielle's guts. Xena had been pacing the camp, checking on the villagers. Checking their skills with knifes, swords and bows. Her mind was racing as she tried to count in each and every possibility of the slave traders actions. She finally picked about a dozen men, who would go with her the last bit of the way, but the only real plan she had was to keep all her options open. She picked a brush and set onto working on Argos fur smoothing out any of the worries that clogged up her mind.

Over the following hours they had been able to close the ring around the slave traders and by late afternoon Xena, Gabrielle and her dozen were blocking their path, a league ahead of the criminals.

Kimos finally brought the message, that there was no escape route left. The boy looked exhausted but eager to fight.

"What do you have to tell me?" Xena asked.

"We have gotten a good sight of the gang. They are at least 10 men, all on horseback and well equipped with weapons."

Gabrielle passed a cup of water to the young man that he drank down hastily.

"Go on," Xena urged.

"They have about 40 children in their midst, hoarding them like sheep."

Blood rose into Kimos' cheeks and Gabrielle wondered if Xena was right? Would the villagers be patiently waiting for Xena's signal, watching how their children were humiliated or hurt?

"The children are tied together in rows of five by the hands and by the necks," Kimos continued with a shaking voice, biting back tears under Xena's steady glare.

"They are headed this way."

Xena spread a hastily drawn map on the ground. Kimos stepped closer and pointed at the map. "They were here about half of an hour glass ago."

A few leagues down the path the forest merged into open grassland. A battle there would leave the villagers without the much needed element of surprise. With the night coming and the underbrush covering their advance Xena figured that it was best to start the attack as soon as possible. She put her hands on Kimos shoulders.

"What are you hiding Kimos?" Xena's voice had become softer now, but also …

"Nothing!" But even Gabrielle could see that something was bothering the boy.

"You know one of those guys, right?"

"Yes, I do" Kimos gave in, "the leaders name is Antioch."

"What can you tell me about him?"

Kimos shrugged: "Not much, really!"

"I need every detail, if we want to succeed"

"He used to live in our village, a rough guy, who would strike up a fight whenever he found a reason. As he decided to go to the military academia in Athens, the elders were all happy to see him leave."

"What else, Kimos?" …"What else?"

"I have never ever seen him loose one single fight."

Xena shrugged, giving Kimos a much needed reassurance. "There is always a first time." She smiled wickedly. "Go back to your folk, Kimos. We need a road block, something to slow them down…"

Her voice trailed off as she studied the map with alert eyes. Gabrielle watched her intendly. In moments like those, she wanted to touch her – draw some of this raw energy and keep it hidden somewhere in a nook of her heart for a moment of need, which she knew would come.

"Here," Xena put a stone on the map "do you think, they'll be able to put it up?" But of course it was not really a question, it was a necessity. So instead of waiting for his answer she continued: "Do you know how to imitate the call of the kingfisher?" Xena whistled the tune of that bird, a high almost breathless ti-it, ti-it. Gabrielle had heard it all around in the last days. It was as unobstrusive as the gentle swaying of the leaves overhead. Kimos put his hand to his mouth and replied. A small smile curled around Xena's mouth. "This is our signal. Tell your people, that they should try to get between the children and the kidnappers – but if this is not possible, they should not hesitate either."

Kimos nodded and stormed off.

"May the gods be with you." Gabrielle whispered.

"Get out of the water!"

Gabrielle almost jumped, she had not heard Xena approaching. Defiantly she leant back into the shallow pool. "Why are you always so damn patronizing?"

Xena shrugged. Old habits die hard she thought, but aloud she said: "I am right – ain't I? Your lips are blue and you are shivering."

Gabrielle opened her mouth for a biting retort, but soon thought the better of it. Shaking she clambered out of the water and huddled into the blanket that Xena passed her. Xena whistled and Argo appeared out of the dark. Gabrielle suddenly felt very tired.

"Can't we just make a fire here?" she croaked, but Xena just lifted her eyebrows and pulled her companion behind her into the saddle. In silence they rode back to their former camp.

Gabrielle, very sleepy now, wrapped her arms around Xena and let her face rest on the shoulder of her friend. Xena felt the gentle friction of the movement and savoured the warmth of Gabrielle's body. She wanted to say so much, but she could not. She could not find words for those feelings that were shifting in her chest and rising slowly to her head.

For once she was sorry, that she had dragged her gentle friend yet again in a crusade, that was bound to fail. She knew that Gabrielle was not above the reproach that hunted her. Xena would probably feel less responsible, less protective if she did not feel so deeply for the bard, but that also needed not to be pointed out.

"I read your scroll,"she said instead, but there was no answer. Gabrielle had fallen asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

It was well before night fall as the catastrophe finally drew to a close. The little group Xena had selected was hidden in the dense underbrush off the path. They had just passed the road block that the village people had fixed up. Not really more than a couple of fallen trees and dry leaves shoveled onto it, but it would have to do. For about 15 paces the slave traders and the children would be forced to walk single file. Under "normal" circumstances the warrior princess would have been pretty sure of her success but there was no war going on. A handful of inexperienced villagers had been circling a ruthless gang for hours now. They might have even done what Xena had told them, but even hiding required some practice.

From the branch of an old tree Xena had chosen as a lookout to refine her plan, she could see them now. The slave traders were careful. Each of the men had a little child in the saddle with him and the shining blades of drawn swords were shimmering through the canopy.

Xena swore under her breath. This situation required a cool head and a steady hand. There was not much time. Once the gang cleared the roadblock this chance would have passed and even Xena did not know if another one would come up any time soon.

She signalled Gabrielle with hand and eyes and the group parted. With a tiny smile she acknowledged that they had come a long way over the past years. Words or codes – as Gabrielle had requested once – were not longer required. Gingerly Xena circled the gang of the slave traders one more time leaving the men along the way and praying for their skills with the bows. A lot of it depended on them now. She met with Gabrielle in the back of the gangsters. They were so close, that she could hear them talk in hushed voices. She handed Gabrielle Argo's reigns. For one last time she looked in Gabrielle's eyes – steady and confident.

With a giant leap she landed right behind the last rascal in his saddle and wrenched him to the ground while whistling the kingfisher tune. The horse with the kid on it stormed off. In that moment Xena heard the soft whirring of arrows that sprang from the bows and a second later the villagers moved in. She advanced on the second man and got him out of the saddle with a few well driven strikes of her sword and put the crying kid down from the horse.

With a piercing Ayiyiyiyi Xena charged at the next guy, but though all her action had taken next to no time this criminal was much better prepared. He had run his blade over the throat of the kid he held and pushed towards Xena.

For the warrior princess time froze. She saw the little girl tipping to the side as blood gushed from her throat. While the girl was falling her eyes broke and with a faint sigh she passed to the other side.

The fury that rose in Xena was unbearable. She pulled her arm back over her head to gather speed for her blade and plunged it into the killer's chest with a single shove. And still she had plenty of time to catch the girl before her tiny body hit the ground. Her hand found the chakram and pushed it off, hitting at least two other guys before they could kill.

"Back off!" A voice cut through the haze in Xena's head and she had to pull all her self control together to stop her body from fighting on. She found herself still holding the little girl in one arm, the chakram in her other hand, poised for a new round, but she would not throw it.

The guy, who had spoken was Antioch without any doubt and the boy in his arms was nobody but a younger version of Kimos. Antioch held his blade onto Taros throat and a trickle of blood down the boys vest indicated that he had already cut him.

"Let this thing fall – or he'll die," Antioch continued, "I am already a bit jumpy and we don't want any more children killed – I guess."

Xena dropped her chakram, she looked around to see, what the villagers had accomplished. From the ten criminals seven were out cold, at least for the time being. A few of the children were bleeding from minor cuts and bruises, but a couple of them were down too and Xena just hoped that they were not dead. Gabrielle took the little girls from her friends arm and in the back of her mind Xena registered the sobbing father rushing towards his daughter. No time now!

"What are your plans – Antioch?"

Xena's voice could have frozen hell, so cold was it, but Antioch was not impressed.

"We are not discussing those here," he said, "but this," he looked around," was surely not what I have planned. If you had not interfered, the children would have reached the coast safe and sound. All of them." He nodded towards the little girl.

"To be sold into slavery for the rest of their lives?"

A sly grin twitched Antioch's face: "Better captured than dead – ha?"

Xena did not answer to this heinous piece of wisdom.

"Well be that as it may," he continued, "you have split up my party for good." He chuckled over his own stupid joke.

"I am more than willing to let you have it your way. You may take the children and do what you want with whatever is left of my men. I will take off, with the man here." He gestured to his pals and the children on their horses."

"I am afraid," Xena replied, "that this is not an option. Hand over the children.."

"I don't think so." He answered and his voice was as hard as Xena's had been, "if I am going to Tartarus. I will take this boy with me. You will back off now and let me go."

He pressed the knife harder on Taros throat and the boy gasped.

"No." Kimos suddenly stormed towards Antioch, "you are not killing my brother."

The slave trader was so taken by surprise that he forgot his plans – he pushed Taros off the horse and started fighting with Kimos. His men quickly rushed to his help. Xena picked up her chakram and took out the last two criminals with a single swoop.The children that stayed safely in the saddles had completely bewildered looks on their faces. But for Kimos all help was too late. Antioch felled him with a parade of his sword a second before Xena's chakram hit his head too.

Taros, bloody and frightened, bent over his brother and Xena heard Kimos utter his last words: "You have been a brave warrior Taros. I want you to always stay that way. I wanted to take you back home, but now it looks like you have to take me back. I love you." And then, he too went over to the other side.

It had been a short fight and a bitter victory. They had lost Kimos and two other children. The rest – even the wounded, would come through, but the price had still been high. Too high!

The villagers gathered their children and the living criminals to bring them to justice in their home towns and then they left one by one quietly shaking hands with the warrior princess and the bard.

Gabrielle felt as if she never would be able to stop crying. Xena cleaned Kimos face. She prepared to return to his village to bring him back to his mother, but his neighbours politely declined her offer. So after a while Xena and Gabrielle found themselves left on the battlefield alone. And without a backwards glance they too moved on. It was not much later as they reached the edge of the forest.

And here they were yet again. Xena helped her sleepy friend off Argo and put the fire on a second time. Night had settled and the stars were out. Xena spread a blanket over Gabrielle and set to sharpen her sword. She felt her friends hand on her thigh.

"Xena?" Gabrielle muttered sleepy.

"Yes?"

"Could you hold me?" Gabrielle's simple question made Xena's heart ache. She put her weapons aside and crawled under the blanket wrapping her arms around the bard. She held her tenderly and asked for nothing, but still peace settled in her chest.

"Good night Gabrielle!"

"Good night Xena!"

A few late crickets were still singing in the grass. There would be new battles to win and new battles to loose, but not now – tomorrow.


End file.
